No same-sex marriage without public vote, senator says

BAYVIEW — Same-sex marriage will not become law in Washington without voter approval, an influential state senator told a raucous Saturday town meeting on Whidbey Island packed with gay rights supporters.

“I will tell you they will not have the votes in the state Senate without a vote of the people,” said state Sen. Mary Margaret Haugen, D-Camano, a 20-year veteran of the Legislature’s upper chamber.

Haugen represents a Republican-leaning Island and Skagit County district that includes liberal pockets, notably South Whidbey, as well as very conservative Oak Harbor. She is usually its only Democratic legislator.

She was confronted Saturday with intense emotion from the liberal end of her constituency. At times, the town hall seemed like a Tea Party confrontation in reverse.

“I must represent the entire 10th District and we have a lot of evangelicals . . .,” Haugen began.

“Don’t even go on,” shouted Laura Taylor, a Clinton resident.

Marriage equality “is going to happen” either this year or in the near future, argued a woman named Chris Berman, standing on a bench in the back. Inevitable or not, “Morally supporting us is very important,” Berman added.

“We are your people,” said Eileen Jackson of Langley.

Haugen kept her cool, confessing — as Gov. Chris Gregoire did last week — that “for me personally this is a tough issue, one of the toughest.” The senator was born on Camano Island and is a lifelong resident of the district she represents. “You can criticize me a lot,” she joked. “I am a big girl and an old girl.”

She is also an influential lady, a moderate Democrat who chairs the Senate Transportation Committee. During her years in Olympia, Haugen has been targeted for defeat by the Building Industry Association of Washington as well as excoriated by Washington Conservation Voters.

One of the nation’s best-known gay rights activists, retired Lt. Col. Grethe Cammermeyer (“Serving in Silence”) stood, silent and tall and regal, against a wall in the back. Cammermeyer is a former Island County Democratic chair. Others carried the argument.

“I can tell you are listening to everyone, but this is an unjust law: This is about an equal rights law. We need you to vote yes,” said Nikki Coyote of Langley.

“I have come a long way,” said Haugen, who has supported the state’s current “everything but marriage” domestic partnership laws. Still, supporting marriage equality would be “a huge step for me.”

But it may be a step too far for the Legislature’s upper chamber, where Democrats have a 27-22 majority but with at least two social conservatives in the caucus.

“There will be no bill in the state Senate if it does not go to the people,” said Haugen.

The veteran senator was not afraid to mix it.

One constituent likened denial of marriage rights to gays and lesbians to racial apartheid in South Africa. “I saw apartheid, I was in South Africa and I can tell you this is different,” Haugen shot back. She recalled the “necklacing” practice in which victims were stuffed in a tire which was then set afire.

Ending her meeting, Haugen suggested that the crowd get in touch with her two conservative 10th District Republican seatmates, state Reps. Barbara Bailey and Norma Smith, and make their feelings known.